What Is There In a Bunch of Greetings?: An Essay on Romans 16:3-16 (NRSV)

Abstract

An African season of reconciliation for justice and peace will bear great fruit only as solidly as it is built on the rock of the mutual recognition of another as a person of equal dignity as oneself; whether the one be male, female or intersex; child, adolescent or adult; slave-born, free-born or mixed; of same, different or multi tribes. Such mutual recognition takes root from the impartiality of Divine grace that should create the same social identity for all those in Christ. Can the African Church embody this tenet faced with tribal/societal class, gender and age stratifications, hierarchies, discriminations? Can cultural norms offer wisdom for this process? Can we find Christian and cultural precedence to draw on? This paper exegetes Romans 16:3-16 picturing how St Paul employs a cultural norm to actualise his teaching of an equal social identity cre-ated by the impartiality of divine grace, for all in Christ